Show Notes

Rated R: Contains some violence.

The Duke of Vertumn’s Fingerling

by Elizabeth Carroll

After I opened my eyes they dressed me in silk. A bone-white gown slipped over my head and I raised my arms for it like a child. With my hair undone, I must have looked like a bride. I was nothing of the kind.

My gown hung on me like a sugar bag. I stood in scraps and patches of fabric. I bound ribbon around my waist, and crossed it over and over between breast and hip. I would be presentable if nothing else.

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About the Author

Elizabeth Carroll is a graduate of Clarion South 2009. She lives in Tasmania, Australia with her husband and the Gerontocracy: two tabby cats of advancing years. She wrote the first draft of “The Duke of Vertumn’s Fingerling” during week 5 of Clarion, after a dream where she was six inches tall and two giant Clarion classmates were discussing her fate. This is her first international publication. For more about the author, see her website.

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About the Narrator

Tina Connolly is the author of the Ironskin trilogy from Tor Books, and the Seriously Wicked series from Tor Teen. Her novels have been finalists for the Nebula and the Norton. Her very first Escape Pod appearance was in #209, when “On the Eyeball Floor” was narrated by Norm Sherman, and she’s been providing narration for PodCastle since our miniature episode 23, about 8 months prior to her first publication with Escape Pod. Her stories are collected in On the Eyeball Floor and Other Stories, from Fairwood Press. She is one of the current co-hosts of Escape Pod, and her narrations have appeared all over.

She is extremely delighted to have had both her stories and her narrations featured on all four Escape Artists podcasts. Find her intermittent, Parsec-winning flash fiction podcast at Toasted Cake, or find her at tinaconnolly.com.